Editorial: DOE denies ulterior motives

It is virtually impossible, despite protests to the contrary, to rid ourselves of the belief that politics has torpedoed the cause of worthwhile science and scholarship.

The U.S. Department of Energy has announced that it will not pay for the Amarillo National Resource Center, which is a consortium of Texas Tech University, the University of Texas and Texas A&M University - despite Congress' already allocating $5 million for the center headquartered in downtown Amarillo.

The result of the decision is that the ANRC, absent a fiscal miracle, will have to cease its research into ways to properly store and dispose of plutonium.

How does politics enter into this discussion?

U.S. Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Clarendon, in whose district the ANRC is located, has taken over as chairman of a special House oversight panel that will examine thoroughly the long-standing problems within DOE's nuclear security system.

Energy Secretary Bill Richardson has made his displeasure known over that panel and over Thornberry's vocal criticism of the Energy Department.

A DOE official on Wednesday denied that there were any political motives in shutting down the ANRC center in Amarillo.

Matthew Donaghue, an Energy Department spokesman in Washington, said the agency "takes its responsibility to the public very seriously."

He added that the department bases its decisions "on what's in the best interests of America's national security, not politics."

OK, fine.

But the agency is saying only that the research at the center is being duplicated at DOE national laboratories elsewhere.

What duplication?

What work?

Some details, please, DOE.

What's more, DOE cut the funds without informing state officials of its decision, forcing them to read about it in the newspaper.

Insensitive?

We believe so.

"The decision appears to have political overtones," said Dale Klein, executive director of the Amarillo National Resource Center and a vice chancellor of the University of Texas System.

However, Thornberry has made it clear that the problems relating to nuclear security at the DOE go back "at least 20 years," and that the agency has come under considerable fire from officials in both political parties.

Moreover, the Amarillo National Resource Center has drawn the support of leading politicians throughout Texas - Democrats as well as Republicans - who have urged the DOE in writing to maintain the center's funding and to allow the ANRC to continue is valuable research in Amarillo.

We agree with Lou Zickar, Thornberry's press secretary.

He said that Pantex's receiving the money constitutes something of a "silver lining" in this decision.

However, it is time for some straight talk from DOE officials.

They must answer for a decision still that appears to be based more on politics than on science.